Got my latest issue of TIME mag, and -- whoo-eee! -- d*mned if that Niall Ferguson, dude they say's this nutty right-winger... I'll be god-d*mned -- if this dude didn't say whut America'd look like 30-some years from now!

Geeeeek!

The truth is, Niall Ferguson did write the cover story for TIME magazine, from the fictional standpoint of 2031.

Wow. And I thought Alvin Toffler was a geek.

Just kiddin'.

So, here's the dope. Apparently, Ferguson believes that in thirty years, a new axis of evil -- Russia, China, and Iran -- will dominate the forces of anti-Americanism.

And that America's mission in the Middle East was doomed.

(So much for conservative "lunacy", right? )

But, of course, that America's economic resurgence would make even this century, an American century.

Quoting JGPH1A (Reply 1):
Great - 3 more billion people for you to hate and dig up derogatory and groundless bile about. I'm amazed you even leave the house as it is, by 2036 you'll be living in your bunker permanently.

Duuuude....

As the dear reader can tell, the royal "we" are not amused by Mr. Ferguson's prognostications.

My predictions, on the other hand....

The truth be told, I think that Ferguson's predictions a bit premature. There is no really compelling reason to believe that Russia, after Putin, or proto-capitalist China, will join with an Iran whose current policies are, admittedly, rabidly anti-American. How would this advance Russia or China's national interests?

After all, Russia and China both have rational interests. (As does, for that matter, France.) I think that Ferguson's predictions are better taken as a warning more than anything else. And it may be valuable if seen in that light.

Nevertheless, a dystopia the likes of which he predicts is in no one's real interests.

Quoting VSLover (Reply 4):
what i'm still holding out for is the fact that in 8 years we will all drive cars in the air on highways in the sky.

My personal inclination is to believe that the prediction of many good things is often compressed by a factor of no fewer than six. That is, a great many good things might happen to Earth as a whole, but no sooner than after a period six times longer than what mainstream "futurists" have thought will be the case.

Thus, whereas futurists in 1960 believed that we would substantially colonize the Moon by 1975, in reality, there will be such colonies on the Moon no earlier than 2050.

Bad things, on the other hand, have a habit of happening sooner than thought. But hardly ever in the way predicted.

Quoting VSLover (Reply 4):what i'm still holding out for is the fact that in 8 years we will all drive cars in the air on highways in the sky.

at least according to back to the future 2...and we have until 2015 for that!

They've been predicting this since the 1960s at least. And there were the famous jet-packs that we'd all be wearing over our one-piece zipless uniforms (how were we supposed to take a dump wearing those?).
Not forgetting trips to the moon by 2001 and instead of having to cook and eat food, we'd look forward to the exciting prospect of sitting down to a table and popping a pill.

And what about the transporter, which would do away with air travel completly? Just stand on a platform and be intstantly zapped to the far side of the world. (Funny, they never explained what would happen in the event of a power failure during transmission).

And despite all these weird and wonderful certainties, no-one thought of the invention which revolutionised the world from the 1990s on: the internet.

Quoting Braybuddy (Reply 6):
And despite all these weird and wonderful certainties, no-one thought of the invention which revolutionised the world from the 1990s on: the internet.

Well, that's right. But in a way, we've been "predicting" the Internet quite some time, now.

Voltaire, way back when, said that he wanted, in his correspondence, to create a "republic of letters". The Internet, if used right, is something of that nature.

The messages we write, and the thoughts we post, create a "cyberspace republic", where the power of ideas holds the maximum sway it can. (Mind you, the "power" of ideas can hardly pay my parking ticket, let alone change the world; only actual people can do that.)

The Internet is a means of communication entirely unanticipated thirty years ago. But the eternal need to communicate, and between those of similar intellectual interests, has been around since the dawn of man.

And now, there is a great means with which to do it.

Heck, counting the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the Internet will soon be interplanetary.

Justification for those episodes of I Love Lucy they're viewing forty or so light-years from Earth, just about now. Not to mention The Twilight Zone.

Quoting AerospaceFan (Reply 8):Voltaire, way back when, said that he wanted, in his correspondence, to create a "republic of letters". The Internet, if used right, is something of that nature.

The messages we write, and the thoughts we post, create a "cyberspace republic", where the power of ideas holds the maximum sway it can. (Mind you, the "power" of ideas can hardly pay my parking ticket, let alone change the world; only actual people can do that.)

While the Republic of Letters was envisioned as a clearing house for information, I think the internet is far, far more than that.

Who would have believed, Arthur C Clarke included, even twenty years ago, that I could switch on my computer, check every airline's price on a particular route, find the cheapest fare, select my seat (okay, Ryanair et al excepted), pay for it and then print my ticket.

Then go to any of the file-sharing sites and search for pratically any song recorded, and download it free from, say, someone on the far side of the planet.

And instead of bothering to leave my house, check out another site for my weekly groceries, order and pay for them, and have them delivered to my door.

And of course do other things like check my bank account, transfer money and read the Sydney Morning Herald if I wanted.

Quoting Braybuddy (Reply 11):While the Republic of Letters was envisioned as a clearing house for information, I think the internet is far, far more than that.

Oh it is, it developed an entirely new way to communicate in real time I don't believe the futurists of old ever envisioned. 15 years ago when I first signed onto AOL, most of us realized that we were pioneers of sort using instant messaging, something that now you can carry on your cell phone wherever you go.

Society as a whole has still changed little in that time, except in the way we communicate, which is why I believe China is still too afraid to fully open the internet to its population.

Remember the excitement you had when you could talk to someone via IM or e-mail, even if they were halfway across the world? What the internet has done is give us the ability to learn what's happening in all four corners of the earth in real time from someone you can trust, because you've built up virtual relationships over time.

The real revolution will come when we all can communicate in similar languages, and understand each other better. Then a new global society will emerge. That's something missing out of all the predictions of the future. We're just on the very cusp of that now.

Quoting AeroWesty (Reply 13):The real revolution will come when we all can communicate in similar languages, and understand each other better. Then a new global society will emerge. That's something missing out of all the predictions of the future. We're just on the very cusp of that now.

Quite optimistic, and I must say I hope you are right!

Communicating with people is often the beginning of further understanding and even friendship.

I hope for nothing less than continued success for the Internet -- a true wonder of technology.